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| Date: Mon, 6 Oct 2014 02:31:37 +0000 (UTC)
From: danny burstein <dannyb@panix.com>
To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Incentive Auctions
Message-ID: <m0suu9$t6e$1@reader1.panix.com>
In <m0sips$1030$1@grapevine.csail.mit.edu> wollman@bimajority.org (Garrett Wollman) writes:
>VHF spectrum in general is very undesirable because of the required
>size of antennas.
But does the over-the-air coverage pattern, so to speak, really
matter that much to many of the broadcasters these days? As long
as they meet FCC requirements to "serve the area" (term used
loosely) well enough to be able to get into the various mandated
"cable shall carry" deal, they'll still be printing money.
>>4. When stations "share time" on the same transmitter, do they give up
>> the capacity for added virtual channels?
>No. However, they do give up bandwidth, which they can make up for
>either by dropping multicasts or by increasing the compression on
>their existing services. There are some DTV stations in the Los
>Angeles market with 10 (very poor quality) subchannels.
We had one in NYC that did the same. I'm not physcially
there right now to jog my memory, but it was something
like two 480i video programs and... 8 other channels
that had a stationary or slow moving video image (basically
just the station ID card) and playing audio.
- one of them was the NOAA weather broadcast...
But that does get me to a related question. Since with PSIP
the "station channel" has no real relationship to the
frequency, couldn't (for example) "channel 4" and
"channel 21" both be using VHF frequency 7, with one
of them tagged (in background, again so to speak)
as 7-1 and one as 7-2, and with one having a good
quality 720p and one a functional 480i ?
--
_____________________________________________________
Knowledge may be power, but communications is the key
dannyb@panix.com
[to foil spammers, my address has been double rot-13 encoded]
|
| Date: Mon, 6 Oct 2014 08:16:02 -0400
From: Bill Horne <bill@horneQRM.net>
To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Incentive Auctions
Message-ID: <20141006121602.GA22554@telecom.csail.mit.edu>
On Mon, Oct 06, 2014 at 02:31:37AM +0000, danny burstein wrote:
> In <m0sips$1030$1@grapevine.csail.mit.edu> wollman@bimajority.org (Garrett Wollman) writes:
> Fred Goldstein wrote:
> >VHF spectrum in general is very undesirable because of the required
> >size of antennas.
>
> But does the over-the-air coverage pattern, so to speak, really
> matter that much to many of the broadcasters these days? As long
> as they meet FCC requirements to "serve the area" (term used
> loosely) well enough to be able to get into the various mandated
> "cable shall carry" deal, they'll still be printing money.
The "VHF Spectrum" Fred referred to is the group of channels I had
suggested might be made available for "5G" data or other
cellular-related use: he was pointing out that cellular providers
don't like VHF because the wavelengths, and thus the antennas, are too
long for use in compact cellphones.
Shorter wavelengths means shorter cellphone antennas, which means that
the Low-VHF spectrum is being shunned by cellular licensees: a
consideration which I had not thought of.
Bill
--
(Remove QRM from my address to write to me directly)
|
| Date: Mon, 06 Oct 2014 10:10:08 -0400
From: Fred Goldstein <fg_es@ionaryQRM.com>
To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Incentive Auctions
Message-ID: <m0u7rv$tgd$1@dont-email.me>
On 10/6/2014 8:16 AM, Bill Horne wrote:
> On Mon, Oct 06, 2014 at 02:31:37AM +0000, danny burstein wrote:
>> In <m0sips$1030$1@grapevine.csail.mit.edu> wollman@bimajority.org (Garrett Wollman) writes:
>> Fred Goldstein wrote:
>>> VHF spectrum in general is very undesirable because of the required
>>> size of antennas.
>>
>> But does the over-the-air coverage pattern, so to speak, really
>> matter that much to many of the broadcasters these days? As long
>> as they meet FCC requirements to "serve the area" (term used
>> loosely) well enough to be able to get into the various mandated
>> "cable shall carry" deal, they'll still be printing money.
>
> The "VHF Spectrum" Fred referred to is the group of channels I had
> suggested might be made available for "5G" data or other
> cellular-related use: he was pointing out that cellular providers
> don't like VHF because the wavelengths, and thus the antennas, are too
> long for use in compact cellphones.
>
> Shorter wavelengths means shorter cellphone antennas, which means that
> the Low-VHF spectrum is being shunned by cellular licensees: a
> consideration which I had not thought of.
>
The other problem is bandwidth. TV channels are 6 MHz wide, and the
whole VHF range is not all that big. So if there is some pressing need
for mobile access to cat videos in higher resolution than can be
provided in 4G LTE, then it will no doubt need wider channels. That
again points to higher frequencies.
|
| Date: Mon, 06 Oct 2014 10:18:48 -0400
From: Fred Goldstein <fg_es@ionaryQRM.com>
To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Incentive Auctions
Message-ID: <m0u8c8$vc4$1@dont-email.me>
On 10/5/2014 10:31 PM, danny burstein wrote:
> In <m0sips$1030$1@grapevine.csail.mit.edu> wollman@bimajority.org (Garrett Wollman) writes:
>
>> VHF spectrum in general is very undesirable because of the required
>> size of antennas.
>
> But does the over-the-air coverage pattern, so to speak, really
> matter that much to many of the broadcasters these days? As long
> as they meet FCC requirements to "serve the area" (term used
> loosely) well enough to be able to get into the various mandated
> "cable shall carry" deal, they'll still be printing money.
Nominal (per FCC contour maps) coverage matters if a station wants
must-carry. Bear in mind, though, that must-carry is normally only
invoked by stations that aren't particularly desirable. A station may
choose to either invoke must-carry, in which case cable doesn't pay it
anything, or it can demand payment per subscriber. The big network
stations are demanding ever-higher payment -- that's why TWC briefly
dropped ABC in New York a couple of years ago. (ABC usually requires
cable to pick up a bunch of channels in a package, including the
ridiculously-expensive ESPN, just to carry the local station.)
>>> 4. When stations "share time" on the same transmitter, do they give up
>>> the capacity for added virtual channels?
>
>> No. However, they do give up bandwidth, which they can make up for
>> either by dropping multicasts or by increasing the compression on
>> their existing services. There are some DTV stations in the Los
>> Angeles market with 10 (very poor quality) subchannels.
>
> We had one in NYC that did the same. I'm not physcially
> there right now to jog my memory, but it was something
> like two 480i video programs and... 8 other channels
> that had a stationary or slow moving video image (basically
> just the station ID card) and playing audio.
> - one of them was the NOAA weather broadcast...
>
> But that does get me to a related question. Since with PSIP
> the "station channel" has no real relationship to the
> frequency, couldn't (for example) "channel 4" and
> "channel 21" both be using VHF frequency 7, with one
> of them tagged (in background, again so to speak)
> as 7-1 and one as 7-2, and with one having a good
> quality 720p and one a functional 480i ?
DTV can include a mix of different resolutions in its mulitplex. So
it's quite common to have one 1024i or 720p full-HD stream (say, "5.1")
eat most of the capacity, while 2 Mbps or so is given over to a 480i SD
stream (like "5.2"). With the incentive auction, they're encouraging
stations to share transmitters with different owners (like "5.1" and
"7.1" on the same transmitter).
|
| Date: Sun, 5 Oct 2014 19:53:23 -0700 (PDT)
From: Neal McLain <nmclain@annsgarden.com>
To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: After blocking personal hotspot at hotel, Marriott to pay FCC $600,000
Message-ID: <288368e3-b85b-4c66-a73f-cb6ca4bb7414@googlegroups.com>
On Saturday, October 4, 2014 10:30:58 PM UTC-5, Monty Solomon wrote:
> After blocking personal hotspot at hotel, Marriott to pay FCC $600,000
>
> Marriott remains defiant: "We believe that the Opryland's actions were lawful."
CommLawBlog's article provides more of the legal background than the Ars article.
http://www.commlawblog.com/2014/10/articles/enforcement-activities-fines-f/marriott-whacked-for-600000-for-war-on-rogue-wifi-hotspots/
-or-
http://tinyurl.com/po65n52
Neal McLain
|
Date: Mon, 6 Oct 2014 17:14:27 +0000 (UTC)
From: wollman@bimajority.org (Garrett Wollman)
To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: After blocking personal hotspot at hotel, Marriott to pay FCC $600,000
Message-ID: <m0uilj$1j5k$1@grapevine.csail.mit.edu>
In article <288368e3-b85b-4c66-a73f-cb6ca4bb7414@googlegroups.com>,
Neal McLain <nmclain@annsgarden.com> wrote:
>On Saturday, October 4, 2014 10:30:58 PM UTC-5, Monty Solomon wrote:
>> After blocking personal hotspot at hotel, Marriott to pay FCC $600,000
>>
>> Marriott remains defiant: "We believe that the Opryland's actions were
>lawful."
>
>CommLawBlog's article provides more of the legal background than the Ars
>article.
>
>
>http://www.commlawblog.com/2014/10/articles/enforcement-activities-fines-f/marriott-whacked-for-600000-for-war-on-rogue-wifi-hotspots/
>
However, they seem to have gotten the technical details wrong. A
"deauthentication packet" sent to an access point does not cause it to
"disconnect from the network". Deauthentication packets are sent by
access points to clients. So Marriott's system must have been
forging deauth frames, pretending to be the user's mobile hotspot,
telling the user's other devices that their connection has been cut
off. Some clients can be configured to ignore these packets, and
would not have been affected.
-GAWollman
Garrett A. Wollman
wollman@bimajority.org
Opinions not shared by
my employers.
|
What intellectual phenomenon can be older, or more oft
repeated, than the story of a large research program
that impaled itself upon a false central assumption
accepted by all practitioners? - S.J. Gould, 1993
|
|
| Date: Mon, 6 Oct 2014 09:16:00 -0400
From: danny burstein <dannyb@panix.com>
To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Bluetooth people trackers in payphone kiosks in NYC
Message-ID: <Pine.NEB.4.64.1410060913430.21693@panix5.panix.com>
yet another reason why outdoor payphones still exist
(working or not...) in NYC
[Buzzfeed]
Exclusive: Hundreds Of Devices Hidden Inside New York City Phone Booths
Beacons can push you ads - and help track your every move.
A company that controls thousands of New York City's phone booth advertising
displays has planted tiny radio transmitters known as "beacons" - devices that
can be used to track people's movements - in hundreds of pay phone booths in
Manhattan, BuzzFeed News has learned.
And it's all with the blessing of a city agency - but without any public
notice, consultation, or approval.
Titan, the outdoor media company that sells ad space in more than 5,000 panels
in phone kiosks around the five boroughs, has installed about 500 of the
beacons, a spokesman for the city's Department of Information Technology and
Telecommunications (DoITT), Nicholas Sbordone, confirmed to BuzzFeed News.
===
rest:
www.buzzfeed.com/josephbernstein/exclusive-hundreds-of-devices-hidden-inside-new-york-city-ph
_____________________________________________________
Knowledge may be power, but communications is the key
dannyb@panix.com
[to foil spammers, my address has been double rot-13 encoded]
***** Moderator's Note *****
Someone fill me in: what is a beacon, and how does it work?
Bill Horne
Moderator
|
| Date: Mon, 06 Oct 2014 11:09:18 -0400
From: Pete Cresswell <PeteCress@invalid.telecom-digest.org>
To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Bluetooth people trackers in payphone kiosks in NYC
Message-ID: <02c53a1m45acah0kauqfcr48pseb5eq0jg@4ax.com>
Per danny burstein:
>www.buzzfeed.com/josephbernstein/exclusive-hundreds-of-devices-hidden-inside-new-york-city-ph
I thought my device had to consent to be paired with another BlueTooth
device.
The article seems to suggest that a nearby BlueTooth device can pair
with my phone with no interaction from me.
Can somebody explain?
--
Pete Cresswell
|
| Date: Mon, 06 Oct 2014 10:59:15 -0400
From: Barry Margolin <barmar@alum.mit.edu>
To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Bluetooth people trackers in payphone kiosks in NYC
Message-ID: <barmar-80C9EE.10591506102014@news.eternal-september.org>
In article <Pine.NEB.4.64.1410060913430.21693@panix5.panix.com>,
Telecom Digest Moderator wrote:
> Someone fill me in: what is a beacon, and how does it work?
It's in the article that was linked in the message:
Beacons are Bluetooth devices that emit simple signals that smartphones
can pick up. They're best known for their growing use in commercial
settings: in stores, for example, to alert customers to sales, or in
stadiums, to tell patrons which entrances are least crowded.
--
Barry Margolin, barmar@alum.mit.edu
Arlington, MA
*** PLEASE post questions in newsgroups, not directly to me ***
***** Moderator's Note *****
I get that they're Bluetooth, and that they've been used for in-store
ads. What I want to know is how the beacons can report on the location
of a cell phone that's nearby, and how such use became possible
without cellphone owners apparently being aware of it.
Bill Horne
Moderator
|
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